Editing Gremlin (section)

{{Short description|Fictional mischievous creature}}
{{About|the fictional creature}}
{{Distinguish|Gmelin (disambiguation){{!}}Gmelin|Kremlin}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2023}}
[[File:Gremlins think it's fun to hurt you. Use care always. Back up our battleskies^ - NARA - 535381.jpg|thumb|upright|A World War II gremlin-themed industrial safety poster]]
A '''gremlin''' is a mischievous fictional creature invented at the beginning of the 20th century to originally explain malfunctions in [[aircraft]], and later in other machinery, processes, and their operators. Depictions of these creatures vary widely. Stories about them and references to them as the causes of especially inexplicable technical and mental problems of pilots were especially popular during and after [[World War II]].<ref name=pq>[https://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-gre1.htm gremlin] on [[World Wide Words]]</ref><ref name=ahd>[https://www.ahdictionary.com/word/search.html?q=gremlin gremlin] in the American Heritage Dictionary</ref>

Use of the term in the sense of a mischievous creature that sabotages aircraft first arose in [[Royal Air Force]] (RAF) slang among British pilots stationed in [[Malta]], the [[Middle East]], and [[British Raj|India]] in the 1920s, with the earliest printed record in a poem published in the journal ''Aeroplane'' in Malta on 10 April 1929.<ref>[http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=gremlin&searchmode=none "gremlin"]. ''[[Online Etymology Dictionary]].'' Retrieved: 12 October 2010.</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=cZ88p_bSt1EC&pg=PA115 ''Word Histories and Mysteries: From Abracadabra to Zeus'']. Lewisville, TX: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2004. {{ISBN|978-0-618-45450-1}}.</ref> Later sources have sometimes claimed that the concept goes back to [[World War&nbsp;I]], but there is no print evidence of this.<ref name="Hazen" />{{refn|Hazen also claims: "It was not until 1922 that anyone dared mention their name."|group=N}}

There is evidence of an even earlier reference in the 1920s, stating that the term was used in the RAF to refer to a lowly menial person,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/gremlin |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190727125241/https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/gremlin |url-status=dead |archive-date=27 July 2019 |title=GREMLIN English Definition and Meaning |publisher=Lexico.com |accessdate=2022-08-24}}</ref> such as a low-ranking officer or enlisted man saddled with oppressive assignments.<ref name=ahd/>